Magenta shrubbery

In st Henri there is a long narrow park, near the canal its called Parc Gédéon-De Catalogne. Plenty of shade and benches, its a place I often sit to rest on the way back from a bike trip, or eat a snack. The paths are paved with pale red interlocking bricks, and magenta flowered-shrubbery grows in square planters. Having almost run out of yellow paint after doing a series of paintings along the Falaise path and highway meadows, I liked the idea of this scene containing a lot of magenta. I got to use plenty of purple magenta (PV55) and bright magenta (PR122), with green accents (PG36). A soft violet shadow cast across the brick which I made with perylene maroon (PR179) and indo blue (PB60). It was a fine day to paint, and sitting here, I got to listen to the band playing at the nearby Canal Festival. 

Magenta shrubbery, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

Falaise escarpment, highway meadows, and other scenes

I'll just keep going, here are today's efforts frm a bike ride I took across the Falaise path towards st Henri direction. In this scene, I am looking up the escarpment at one of the gravel paths that leads into the dense forest. I saw a picture of this from around 1940's and the whole escarpment was sun-baked gravel, but now its fully grown back. Locals curate the forest, and the City of Montreal has an $11 million project to rehabilitate the area. As you can see, there is a danger of rockfall here. 

Rockfall warning Falaise escarpment, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

That didn't stop me from going up the path! I survived ile de la Reunion in the Indian Ocean after all, and the rockfall there is serious, not to mention with an active volcano. No volcano here, at the top of the path was st Jacques street and a Tim Horton's store in the distance. The Akhavan grocer is right beside me here, to the left. 

Foliage traffic Tim Horton's, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

Carefully walking my bike back down to the path, I caught a view of the Lachine canal, or rather, the Gantry crane that is beside the canal. A train actually went by, and I tried to paint it in, but it ended up looking like the Lachine canal! So I just went with the idea. 

Gravel path canal view, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

Where the old highways once were, are gravel fields that have slowly gone to pasture. Last time I was around here, last summer, it was almost all gravel, and some nice cosmos flowers. With all the rain, today it looked like a lush prairie field. There was a type of white flowering grassy plant emitting a wonderful floral smell across the area. In the background you see the st Jacques bridge and mega hospital off to the right.  

Highway meadow city view, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026 

 

Standing on the same spot but looking west, you see part of a highway ramp, and landscaped yellow and red bushes. Given enough time and this whole area will become a forest, there are already trees growing including sumac, and the aspen-hybrid style trees that grow along the nearby canal. To create a sense of breezy wind, I painted waves of green and yellow followed by directional brush strokes. I had a 'boonie hat' on which provided maximum sun protection although it was a hazy overcast day.  

Breeze on highway meadows, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026  

 

At the end of the meadow fields, there is a massive triple overpass, part of the Turcot interchange. Highways also run underneath, you see a bus going by. On the other side of all this is the Twisty groove field where I often paint. 

Triple overpass Turcot, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026   

At the Kruger paper recycling factory, they cut a large square out of the wood fence so that people can see in. There is even a sign indicating that this is a viewing area. I wondered how many people have dropped by to gaze into the paper recycling factory? it didn't seem to be a big tourist draw. The scene is actually more impressive that the painting indicates, I will give it another go some time. 

Stacks of shredded paper, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026    

Looking west along the long line of the Kruger factory, here is a perspective scene. On the bottom right is the highway meadow. I was running out of yellow paint by now and had to find scenes without too much yellow. I know how Van Gogh must have felt, he was constantly running out of yellow paint according to his letters. 

Kruger factory perspective, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026    

Taking a detour down a side street and I found this scene of a parking lot full of red double-decker tour buses. These are the ones we see driving tourists around downtown Montreal in the summer. The large building behind is a storage shed and mechanic. 

Double-decker tour buses, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026    

 

Algae and other scenes along the Lachine canal

Painting in my favorite place to paint, with sunny weather, I did a few neat scenes including this one of a ditch full of bright chartreuse-colored algae. In the background, you see part of the Kruger paper recycling factory working away. The ditch is full of water, which filled up with some healthy looking algae, I used plenty of bismuth yellow (PY184) and a touch of green (PG36) to get the right hue. Sumacs and other plants grow up and down the steep embankments. The sun was going down at the time, which created a rich colour saturation.  

Algae ditch, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

In ville st Henri, a large unused parking lot is adorned with graffiti, and a tall communication tower. That PJD person is a notorious graffiti writer, just kidding, I replaced ZONEK with my own initials and the year. Concrete dividers also display my initials in stylized font, originally it said WYZE who is an old school writer still active. 

Comm tower graffiti, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

An old field gone to pasture, its across the street from the comm tower. I've painted here many time before, today milkweed was abundant across the field, which seems to have been mowed recently. Hopefully there will be butterflies again this summer to make paintings of. 

Twisty groove tree bench, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

Near the old Maltage factory, along the Lachine canal is this utility building they have been working on for many years now. By the looks of it, this is water pumping station, since pipes and tubes are visible through the semi-transparent glass walls. On the lower half it is clad in small square tiles in ultramarine blue. Ancient graffiti was barely visible along this part of the canal. 

New pump station, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026 

Sunset factory views

The other day I made bunch of paintings down by the canal after work, this was the last one I did on the day as the sun set on the Falaise escarpment. In the foreground is part of the Kruger paper recycling factory. Smoke stacks off to the right, unseen in the painting, were hissing loudly the whole time, it must have been time to boil the paper and cardboard. I waited a little while for the sun to hist the tree line, and found a good composition. Starting with the sky, I made a yellow, orange, and magenta pattern around the sun (which is just the white paper), then applied a blue-orange fade on the rest of the sky. Outlining the factory in paint, I then filled in the escarpment trees with perylene green (PBk31) mixed with some pyrol orange (PO73) and carbon black (PBk6). Where the sun meets the tree line, its just the pyrol orange to give a glowing effect. 

Sunset Kruger recycling factory, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

Further to the east, and about 25 minutes earlier, I made this painting of the sun going down behind the old Maltage factory. Located next to the still active st Ambroise brewery, this giant structure has been the subject of many paintings, and quite often photographers are there taking pictures of it as I paint. Similar to the first painting, I made rings of yellow, orange and magenta, but then applied a thin yellow ochre (PY43) wash, with quick brushstrokes in blue (PB15) and blue green (PB15 + PG7) to give the sense of clouds. Working fast keeps the sky looking smooth... wait too long and the clouds get hard edges which looks unpleasant. I've gotten pretty good at painting skies over the years. I did a page called How to Paint Skies, it has almost 400 views!

Sun down old maltage factory, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026 

Westhaven summer flowers

At the end of Harley street in Westhaven neighborhood, the community planted flowers around the concrete blocks. They really brightened up the neighborhood, and I drop by frequently to paint scenery. I did a series of chair paintings around here like here and here. In this scene, I stood in the shade of a large tree, looking towards Raffi auto shop. Starting with yellow, cream, and violet washes, I worked up the green foliage, red hydrant, and dark earth contrast elements. The background is in shadow, which provides some nice cool colours to set up the warm flower colours. 

Westhaven summer flowers, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

Looking back: London Ontario ducks, campus, The Bay

Going back 20 odd years, and they were odd indeed, here is a scene of some ducks on grass in front of what I suspect is the Thames river in London Ontario. I was there at University of Western doing a bachelor's of science followed by a doctorate, making paintings along the way. These paintings are done sometime between 2000 - 2004. The signature is in cerulean blue so its probably 2002. 

Ducks near Thames, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, 200x 

I know this scene very well, I walked past it hundreds of times on my way to the research laboratory in Robart's Research Institute. For some reason there is what appears to be a Hungarian flag in the background. 

Walkway overpass, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, 200x

Perhaps too honest of a depiction, here is an empty parking lot and the Bay in the background. I actually remember doing this one, towards the end of my stay in London, its probably 2003 or 2004. The clouds are neat.  

The Bay empty parking lot, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press,  200x

 

Happy Canada day, stormy day

Down in st Pierre the city has nearly finished the massive road work project, most of the road is paved and sidewalks fresh concrete. Near the old disused train tracks, a group of tents were set up, one had a faded Canada flag, the other a Mohawk flag which I recognized. Cars were all around, do people wonder what I am painting?

Tents Canada and Mohawk flags, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

 

Somehow evoking the Group of Seven, this painting shows a concrete factory under a stormy sky. I had to paint the underlayers first, do another painting, and finish it when dry. 

Concrete facotry stormy day, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

 

A looping gravel path connects the bridge to the bike path next to the canal. You have to be careful zooming down this path with oncoming bikes in both directions. A large tree grows here, its a great tree to paint, large chunks of bark and subtle orange-olive colouring. 

Path to path tree canal, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

 

This old bridge is still really active, at one point in history it could raise and lower, hence the large counter-balance. Now its fixed in place because only small recreational watercraft are allowed on the canal. 

Bridge green reflections, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026

 

Waiting for the concrete factory painting to dry, I turned and did this one quickly, just trying to see if I could get the car right and capture its rare olive-orange colour. I still have some work to do, of course, cars only sit there for a few seconds, and I am not working from photographs.  

Lemon lime car, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2026